LONDON, July 20, 2000
AP
(CBS) And a letter...is perhaps all you should send to Britain from now on, if you want any privacy. In the next few days, the British government is poised to pass what's best known as the Big Browser law. It will allow the government to read any e-mail sent to or from an Internet site in Britain supposedly to catch terrorists and thieves using the net.

It will also allow them to monitor everything you do on your computer: How many times a day you log on, what sites you visit, how much is in your e-banking account. If the police want to watch you, all they'll need is the say-so of one lower-ranking politician.

And don't think they won't use it. Police wire-tapped some 18,000 phone lines in Britain this year alone.

The only other countries already using similar technology are Singapore, Malaysia, and Russia none exactly known as paragons of free speech.

And here's the kicker: Internet service providers will be required by this law to install black boxes to connect their e-traffic with British security services MI5 and MI6. Experts estimate that's going to cost up to a billion dollars a year, eventually forcing Internet providers to raise their rates, and forcing Internet users...to pay for Big Brother Britain.